Health Officials Order More Denghue Testing Kits

Solomon Islands top health officials are now working on ordering more testing kits for the dengue fever outbreak that has so far claimed one life.

A state of emergency is now already in place at the national referral hospital to enable staff to defer all non-emergency patients in favour of those with the mosquito-borne illness.

The ministry of health’s permanent secretary says it is the first time there has been such a large scale outbreak in Solomon Islands and there are at least 169 people known to have the illness.

Dr Lester Ross says the ability to diagnose further cases depends on the availability of rapid diagnostic testing.

“With the limited number of RDT (Rapid Diagnostic Tests) we have we are not doing RDT on every single case of fever. There are some warning signs like people with some abnormal bleeding or severe abdominal cramp or dehydration or vomiting - these are the cases they do the rapid diagnostic test.”

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